NEW BATTLES WITHOUT HONOR AND HUMANITY

Kinji Fukasaku,
Japan,
1974, Arrow Films

In the early 1970s, Kinji Fukasaku's five-film BATTLES WITHOUT HONOR AND HUMANITY series was a massive hit in Japan, and kicked off a boom in realistic modern yakuza films based on true stories. Although Fukasaku had intended to end the series, Toei Studio convinced him to return to the director's chair for this unconnected follow-up trilogy, each starring BATTLES leading man Bunta Sugawara and telling separate, but fictional stories about the yakuza elsewhere in Japan.

Each one is also a top-notch crime action thriller: hard-boiled, entertaining, and distinguished by Fukasaku's directorial genius, funky musical scores by composer Toshiaki Tsushima, and the onscreen power of Toei's greatest yakuza movie stars.

Bunta Sugawara is Miyoshi, a low-level assassin of the Yamamori gang sent to jail after a bungled hit. Meanwhlie, family member Aoki (LONE WOLF AND CUB's Tomisaburo Wakayama) attempts to seize power from the boss, and Miyoshi finds himself stuck between the two factions with no honorable way out...